The Courtesan's Secret Page 16

  If she hadn’t been so well brought up, Louisa would have hit someone.

  “You don’t look happy,” George Grey said. “I could fix that for you.”

  “You are misinformed,” she said stiffly, staring with what she suspected was longing in the precise direction of Dutton, who was saying something to Amelia at the moment, which resulted in Amelia smiling politely.

  Good girl, Amelia.

  Polite, but not enthusiastic. As Dutton was twelfth in line for some obscure dukedom in Northumbria, which was inhospitable at best, Dutton could not fail to be of no interest to Amelia.

  “Don’t listen to him, Lady Louisa,” Penrith said softly, his voice as seductive as a siren’s call. Though the sirens were supposed to have been women and almost certainly Greek, she thought the description more apt than not. “You look as you should and as you always do: completely lovely.”

  It was at that point that Dutton whispered something in the general direction of Amelia’s ear. Amelia blushed and laughed rather more enthusiastically than was proper. Ruan cocked his head and studied Ameila in what looked to be surprise.

  Amelia was looking less good by the minute.

  Someone down table dropped a fork on his plate, creating a very disharmonious sound which perfectly coincided with her current mood. Louisa looked to the source and found herself staring at Blakesley. His blue eyes blazed down the table at her. Given her present situation, she could only respond in one fashion: she blazed her eyes back at him.

  Did he think she was enjoying her current predicament?

  Really, Blakesley could be so difficult. In fact, he seemed to relish being difficult.

  Before she could look away, and she needed to look away for, if she was not mistaken, George Grey had put his fingertips on her seat and was a scant inch away from touching her thigh, Blakesley shifted his gaze, clearly indicating that she should excuse herself and meet him somewhere outside of the room. As the first course had just been served, she couldn’t possibly leave now.

  She was clearly communicating that with her eyes when Mr. George Grey chose that exact moment to slide his fingertips under her leg just above the knee.

  Louisa, without a moment’s thought, signaled a footman to pull back her chair, stood, mouthed an excuse to his grace, the Duke of Hyde, who was likely a more sympathetic audience than his wife, Molly, and left the red reception room by the door that led into the yellow drawing room.

  It was only then, in that large room that was deserted and barely lit by a pair of candlebra of five branches each, that she took a breath. It was a shaky breath, but she deserved it. Had she not escaped a savage Indian? Had he not actually touched her?

  It was on her third, trembling breath that Blakesley entered the room from another, more secluded, doorway. He looked raging mad. Whatever was wrong with him? He had good placement at the table and she was quite certain that no Indian had mauled him.

  “Do you want your pearls or not, Louisa? For if you continue on as you are, you will find yourself married to either an Iroquois warrior and living at lake’s edge in North America or saddled with Penrith, who will use you abominably.”

  That stopped her for a full second, but she was a strong girl and recovered quickly.

  “Are you saying that Penrith would use me worse than Grey? You must be daft. At least Penrith keeps his hands to himself.”

  Blakesley’s expression grew quite hard at that, which was preposterous. She hadn’t done a thing.

  “Has he touched you?”

  Even though she had seen Blakeley toss off a hard look in her direction every now and again, and therefore she could say quite assuredly that he did not frighten her in the least, there was something about this expression that gave her pause. Which was quite an unusual reaction for her.

  Quite.

  Blakesley took a step nearer to her, which brought him closer than was usual and which, in the dim light, made his eyes look almost menacing.

  Louisa was in no mood to be menaced. Hadn’t an Indian just touched her? Hadn’t she endured quite enough from men this horrid evening? Hadn’t Dutton made Amelia laugh?

  “Louisa,” Blakesley said, “answer me.”

  She wanted to tell him to leave her alone, to go rot along with every man in London and a few in Sussex whom she had little use for, to forget that she’d ever had pearls to lose or a heart to break.

  She wanted to tell him that he could have Miss Prestwick and her shining black hair and her flawlessly set diamonds and that he had no right to ask about Mr. Grey or any other man.

  She wanted to tell him that he had no right to mention her at White’s.

  She wanted to tell him that she didn’t like at all where she was sitting at dinner.

  She wanted to tell him that the evening was a dismal affair without his company and his comments.

  She wanted to tell him that he was the most sarcastic man she had ever met and that he made her laugh as no other could, and that she quite possibly hated him for that.

  Because Dutton never made her laugh. Dutton . . . she couldn’t quite remember the exact color of Dutton’s eyes, and that was because Blakesley’s blue eyes were slicing into her heart. He had ruined Dutton for her and that was unforgiveable.

  Couldn’t he see that it was unforgiveable?

  All those things and more were on the tip of her tongue to tell him, but she made the mistake, the simple mistake, of looking up into his eyes and seeing the warm flame of candlelight there and the feel of his hand on her arm and his breath on her skin . . . and then it happened.

  She kissed him.

  Oh, he didn’t make it easy for her. He was Blakesley, after all, and a man doesn’t change simply because he’s kissed. He stiffened and then he froze, forcing her to do all the work, and it must be admitted that, as it was her first kiss, she didn’t know what she was doing, not really, but she was earnest and eager and that must have showed because, just then, just when she thought she’d ruined the very last friendship she felt she had, Blakesley kissed her back.

  Of course, that changed everything.

  He touched her. With his tongue and his hands, and even his leg slid its way between hers, pressing against the fabric, pushing softly, urgently to nestle against her.

  He was hot, his hands and mouth and leg.

  He strained, his tongue pressing, dancing, pushing.

  He pushed, pressing her against his length, forcing her to feel the hard, hot jut of his arousal.

  He moaned briefly, a hot rush of air into her mouth and she shocked herself by moaning back, echoing him in this strange new language of beating hearts and grasping hands.

  He wrapped one arm around her back so that she could not move except to move toward him, against him.

  His other arm, his hand, touched her thigh, encased it and lifted, pressed, controlled her.

  And his mouth devoured her.

  And she devoured him in return.

  Measure for measure.

  Like for like.

  She wrapped her arms around his shoulders, pulling the weight of his chest against her bosom, twined her tongue against his, held his bicep in her hand and would not let him move away from her, or take his hands off of her.

  She hardly remembered it was Blakesley because the kiss consumed her and carried her along on a river of embers.

  But it was Blakesley and couldn’t possibly have been anyone else because she could never have let herself run wild like this with anyone else.

  Thinking, just now, gave her a headache.

  Best just to kiss and kiss again.

  She liked kissing.

  Who would have thought it?

  She opened her mouth a bit farther, to match him, just to match him, because he was Blakesley and she could trust him to teach her how to kiss, to make sure she was doing it right, and that she wasn’t bungling it completely, and the kiss instantly became hotter and wetter and more . . . intimate.

  Intimacy.

  With Blakesley. />
  It seemed right somehow.

  Safe.

  Yes, safe, and because it was, she snuggled in deeper, running her hands under his coat and around his back, encompassing his waist nicely, firmly, and he had a nice waist, trim and taut, and of course she had known that about Blakesley because he could eat absolutely anything and never gain an inch, whereas she could not eat more than one sweet a day, which was horridly unfair because too often she had to watch Blakesley eat five desserts at once.

  Desserts . . . kissing Blakesley was like eating a delicious dessert. Delicious?

  Louisa tilted her head and angled her kiss a bit deeper, pressing her breasts against Blakesley’s chest, which was also nice and firm . . . and hot . . . and moaned in regret when Blakesley, for no reason at all that she could see, grabbed her by the upper arms and pushed her away from him. And rather roughly at that.

  His eyes were blue coals, his mouth a thin line of repression, and he said, “God, enough. Enough. I’m blind with it.”

  Ridiculous nonsense. Blind? She had never seen more clearly. Blakesley’s mouth and Blakesley’s eyes and Blakesley’s hands. She needed those hands, that mouth. She needed them to touch her, now.

  So, what else was she to do?

  She ignored him, which was only logical, and lunged toward him so forcefully that he took two or three steps backward and bumped against the door and somehow, because he was a man and had longer arms, she was sure of it, somehow he held her off.

  But not before she had touched his chest with her hands, and run her hands fleetingly along his arms.

  She’d got some satisfaction off him, anyway.

  The flare of passion and surprise in his eyes just before he’d hit the door had been rather nice, too.

  “Louisa! Stop!” he barked.

  Wonderful. First he kissed her and now he spoke to her like an unruly pup. It really was not at all as she’d hoped the evening would turn out.

  “What are you doing?” he snapped, straightening his waistcoat, his fingers lingering at the hem and fussing suspiciously there. Hmm.

  “I thought we were kissing,” she said, watching his hands.

  “Yes,” he said gruffly, “and if anyone had seen us, you’d be ruined.”

  “I’m not going to allow you to ruin me, Blakes,” she said, mostly because she suspected it would annoy him dreadfully.

  “My mother calls me Blakes,” he said stiffly, his face looking quite angular in the shadowy light. She liked it. She liked everything about this moment, she decided.

  The feeling of his kiss on her mouth still tingled, as well as her breasts and, as long as she was taking an inventory, a warm puddle of feeling was swirling between her legs.

  She rather suspected that some warm something was doing things to the place between Blakesley’s legs because he kept his hand suspiciously near his groin.

  It really was too funny, and she wasn’t the sort of girl not to take advantage of a man when he was so clearly vulnerable.

  Smiling, she took a step nearer to him. Blakes, as she had suspected he would, took a step backward.

  Oh, it was too, too easy.

  “You can’t mean that you’ve mistaken me for your mother,” she said, twirling her lovely curl, which she suspected was rather the worse for wear and, strangely, did not concern her in the least.

  “Of course that’s not—”

  “Or that I reminded you of your mother when I kissed you,” she interrupted, closing on him. His heel hit the wall and he side-stepped a small console table of delicate proportions and kept the distance between them.

  “My point,” he said harshly, which couldn’t have delighted her more, “was that it is a name used between intimates, Louisa, and you don’t qualify.”

  “Don’t I?” she whispered, pulling on her curl, watching his gaze follow her hand. “Can’t we change that?”

  “I beg your pardon?” he said hoarsely, his gaze riveting again on her face.

  She took a step nearer to him and was delighted to find that he remained rooted to the spot. He was weakening, how lovely. Well, but didn’t they always? Men were so weak when it came to these sorts of encounters. Everyone knew that. Why, just look at her father. He was like soft pudding when it came to women.

  “I mean,” she said softly, playing with him like a cat with a mouse, and didn’t that just explain why cats always looked so contented? “I thought that, after our kiss that, aren’t we? Isn’t that enough intimacy to classify as . . . intimacy? Or is there more, Blakes? You would tell me if there were more, wouldn’t you?”

  He didn’t move after that. Perhaps he couldn’t; she’d like to think so.

  She didn’t know why she’d kissed him, what had prompted the thought, though it was likely something Sophia had said since Sophia was known to be a bad influence on nearly everyone and, as strong-minded as Louisa was, she supposed even the worst influence would rub off on her eventually.

  That remark about flies to manure and using what skill she could to win the wager still sang somewhere dark in her thoughts, but she didn’t have time to bother thinking about that at the moment. Or ever. She had Blakes before her and he was practically hers for the taking, though what she was supposed to do with him or how she was supposed to “take” him were matters of some mystery.

  Even though Melverley was a complete rogue, she still was more innocent than not.

  She was being driven by instinct, which had its own delights, but little more.

  It seemed to be enough.

  “This is no game, Louisa, and I am not some toy you have recently discovered,” Blakes said, seeing things a little more clearly than was entirely comfortable. Blakes was in the habit of doing that and it was one of his many annoying traits.

  If she slowed down at all she would think of all sorts of reasons why kissing Blakes was a bad idea.

  Best not to slow down then, obviously.

  “Didn’t you tell me that I had to behave in a certain way to get my pearls back? Isn’t this what you had in mind?”

  “This is all about your pearls, then?” he said, brows dipped low in suspicion.

  “What else could it be about?” she said with a snap of annoyance. “I thought I was supposed to be seen with you, or was there more to the wager?”

  “No one can see us now, Louisa,” he said softly.

  His face was almost in full shadow, the few candles in the room hardly sufficient to light more than their forms. She preferred it that way; it was much easier to be brazen in the darkness, which was likely why unmarried girls were discouraged from being alone with gentlemen in the dark.

  “Which is why,” she said, “I thought it a good time to practice.”

  “Practice what, Louisa?”

  “Practice kissing, obviously. The way I understand it, I am to be seen more in your company than anyone else’s, you win the wager, I get my pearls back, and then I am free to engage in my preferred behavior. As long as we are to spend time together, I thought I might as well learn how to kiss. Before it really matters.”

  She wasn’t at all certain why she’d thrown that last bit in. It was bold, possibly reckless, perhaps even dangerous. But she was so very tired of men discounting her, ignoring her, and worse, some of them likely even avoided her.

  Wouldn’t it be lovely, just for once, to be noticed? To be pursued? To be desired? Even if it was somehow tangled up in a wager, it might be her best chance for . . . something. She wasn’t certain quite what, but she wanted something more than she currently had and, naturally, she wanted it with Blakesley.

  That seemed entirely reasonable to her.

  Unfortunately, she hadn’t anticipated the depth and breadth of Blakeley’s response.

  “Oh, this matters,” he said in a soft snarl. “I am not for practice. I am not a game piece you move about the board in your efforts to win Dutton.”

  He knew about Dutton? Of course, she’d suspected that he suspected, but to have it so boldly thrown in her face, it was un
bearable. Just how many people knew she had a tendre for Dutton?

  “I never said—”

  He took a step nearer and put one hand hard over her mouth, and with the other, he pulled her up so that she stood toe-to-toe with him.

  “When I’m with you, you’ll think of me. When I’m not with you, you’ll think of me. You’ll do this because I’ll kiss you until the only thought left in your head is of me, my mouth, my hands, my name. But I’ll not ruin you, Louisa, never that. You’ll be safe from that, but not from me.”

  He was breathing into her face, his eyes glistening and hard in the soft light, the sounds of his brother’s celebration coming to them from beyond the door, his weight a presence she could feel against the soft muslin of her dress. He didn’t move. She didn’t move. She’d never known such force, such energy was hidden behind Blakesley’s cool and cynical exterior. She was entirely certain that she wasn’t meant to know, that no one was meant to know.

  She breathed softly and held his gaze, their eyes locked, their breath coming in tandem.

  When he moved his hand from off her mouth, she didn’t move. He didn’t move. They stared and studied each other until she thought she’d die from the examination. Things simply could not stand as they were. She did not care to be examined, especially by Blakesley, whom, it was suddenly clear, saw too much.

  With the most casual inflection imaginable, she said, “Of course you’ll not ruin me, Blakes. Did you think I’d allow that? What will happen is that I will ruin you.”

  He gave a short bark of laughter before she pulled him down to her and her mouth captured his again. He responded instantly. It was a kiss of passion, or that was her nearest guess. Perfect.

  IT was less than perfect, that was certain. Amelia was seated nowhere near any available dukes, which surely was no accident, yet seated directly in between the lords Ruan and Dutton, which also appeared maliciously intentional. Amelia didn’t know what she could have done to offend the Duchess of Hyde, but Molly seemed to have taken particular pleasure in seating her next to the exact two men she could have no possible interest in.

  Dutton, for all that she could see, was a pure waste of skin. Rakes, and he definitely was one, held no interest for her at all. Why, even if he’d managed to be a duke she would have been hard-pressed to talk herself into pursuing him. Thank goodness there was no need. Dutton was not a duke, but he was her dinner companion, which meant she could not politely ignore him, as was her usual practice.